Tuesday, August 08, 2006

A trump card in the nuclear power play: "Flannery concludes his book by arguing that 'there is no need to wait for government action' - voluntary action by well-meaning consumers is the only way to save the planet.... This is music to the Government's ears. The assignment of individual responsibility is consistent with the economic rationalist view of the world, which wants everything left to the market, even when the market manifestly fails.... It is obvious why a government that wants to do nothing finds such an approach appealing: it can pretend to be concerned while protecting powerful business interests."

It would be hard to imagine anything more mindnumbingly irresponsible than this, or anything more downright stupid as this cargo-cult 'market provides' ideology.

Let's be under no illusions: in the face of this global catastrophe, we find our governments and major political parties (not to mention media and intellectuals) effectively owned and controlled by corporate interests whose goal is short term profit under the banner of an ideology which says 'market provides, get govt out of the way.'

And as if collective action and individual political activism was not an expression of 'personal responsibility' towards the problem.

A trump card in the nuclear power play: "Flannery concludes his book by arguing that 'there is no need to wait for government action' - voluntary action by well-meaning consumers is the only way to save the planet.... This is music to the Government's ears. The assignment of individual responsibility is consistent with the economic rationalist view of the world, which wants everything left to the market, even when the market manifestly fails.... It is obvious why a government that wants to do nothing finds such an approach appealing: it can pretend to be concerned while protecting powerful business interests."

It would be hard to imagine anything more mindnumbingly irresponsible than this, or anything more downright stupid as this cargo-cult 'market provides' ideology.

Let's be under no illusions: in the face of this global catastrophe, we find our governments and major political parties (not to mention media and intellectuals) effectively owned and controlled by corporate interests whose goal is short term profit under the banner of an ideology which says 'market provides, get govt out of the way.'

And as if collective action and individual political activism was not an expression of 'personal responsibility' towards the problem.